So I will openly admit that I really have sucked at blogging, but in my defense we had the first ever most beuatiful summer in as long as I can remember here in Anchorage, so when I got off of work, I spent the majority of my time outside. We had an incredibly busy summer and I feel like I have SO much to update on, so you will be inundated with so many blogs today :) Sorry in advance!
The first and very big moment of our summer was Sophia's Make a Wish trip. I REALLY struggled with sending her in for a wish, but with two heart surgeries in 27 days, I felt that my baby girl was due. So in between Sophia's two surgeries I asked her if she could have wished for anthing what would it be, I told her that she could wish to go anywhere, meet anyone, or do something. Well, Sophia looked at me and said that she wanted to meet Felix Hernandez of the Seattle Mariners. I thought it was a long shot or that we would wait at least a year, but I thought, what the heck...I'll give it a shot. Well, our wish grantors picked up Sophia's application quicker then I thought and got right on her wish. In what seemed liked no time at all, we were told that we were heading to Seattle to meet Felix Hernandez. Jason and I learned about it right before we went to Seattle for her open heart sugery, so the evening before her surgery, when we took her out to dinner, we presented her with a pink Mariners jersey and told her that she was going to get to meet King Felix. To say that my daughter was excited was an understatment. We weren't exactly sure of the dates, but at elast we knew that her wish was going to come true.
Fast forward a couple of months and we were on our way to sunny Seattle in mid June. I can't leave out the awesome send off that we got here in Anchorage. The Anchorage Bucs, the minor league team here, did a little send of for Fia and it was a lot of fun. We had our closest friends and family there with us and the day couldn't have been more perfect. We were on a plane to Seattle a little while later that evening and Sophia and Gabi were on cloud nine. They were so excited about the limo that picked us up from the airport; they have never been in a limo before and they thought they were the coolest kids in town. We stayed right next to Safeco...which is nice for night games and we settled in after an early flight to Seattle.
Well our first day, Sophia got to have her wish and meet King Felix. It's almost been three months since our trip and I still can't beleive the expierience we had. Jason and I have been Mariners fans for as long as I can remember, and as a Mariner fan that grew up in a house with Giants fans, I have always felt that it is important to let your children chose the teams they are going to like, if they chose to be sports fans. (which is REALLY hoped our girls would be) We have been lucky enough with baseball that the girls are also Mariner fans and I can't begin to describe how amazing the Seattle Mariners organization is. Before we made our trip over to Safeco we learned that Kyle Seager, who has a similar condition as Sophia, wanted to meet her. (Kyle Seager was a special player in our home, because we knew about his heart condition and of course that is something very special to our family) Sophia was outfitted up with her own Mariners jersey and she was in HEAVEN. She definitely started off very shy but anyone that knows Sophia knows that you just need to spend a little time with her and she will warm straight up to you. The players and the Mariners organization were incredible and made not only Sophia feel special, but they made Gabi feel special. All of the players that we met that day were incredible and Sophia still talks about Felix today. What I love the most about her innocence, is that to Sophia, Felix is just a friend of hers that happens to play baseball and is on TV every once in a while. It's beautiful.
The second day we had dinner at the Space Needle, which was amazing and the girls had so much fun. We went to another game on the third day there and again the girls were in heaven.
Seattle is our happy place again. It was a place from 2001 until 2009 that we got travel to and watch baseball games and go to Pike's Place and have fun. After Sophia was born, Seattle became a place we only went for surgeries. This trip broght Seattle back to our happy place. Jason and I made the decision to go back to Seattle at least once a year to watch a baseball game, no matter if Sophia has a surgery scheduled or not. The girls had so much fun and it was the first time in a long time that I saw both of them really smile. Thank you Make A Wish and Seattle Mariners!
